The Trump administration has ordered the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to stop nearly all its work, effectively shutting down an agency that was created to protect consumers after the 2008 financial crisis and subprime mortgage lending scandal.
Russell Vought, the newly installed director of the Office of Management and Budget, directed the CFPB, in a Saturday night email confirmed by The Associated Press, to stop work on proposed rules, to suspend the effective dates on any rules that were finalized but not yet effective, and to stop investigative work and not begin any new investigations. The agency has been a target of conservatives since President Barack Obama pushed to include it in the 2010 financial reform legislation that followed the 2007-2008 financial crisis.
The email also ordered the bureau to “cease all supervision and examination activity.”
On Sunday, administration officials also said that the CFPB’s headquarters in Washington, D.C. would be closed the week of Feb. 10 through Feb. 14, according to an email obtained by The Associated Press. No reason was given for closure.
“Employees and contractors are to work remotely unless instructed otherwise,” the email to headquarters workers says.
The order follows similar efforts by the White House to dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development.
Since the CFPB is a creation of Congress, it would require a separate act of Congress to formally eliminate it. But the head of the agency has discretion over what enforcement actions to take, if any.
Yet Elon Musk commented, “CFPB RIP” on social media site X on Friday. And the CFPB homepage on the Internet was down Sunday, replaced by a message reading “page not found.”
Also late Saturday, Vought said in a social media post that the CFPB would not withdraw its next round of funding from the Federal Reserve, adding that its current reserves of $711.6 million is “excessive.” Congress directed the bureau to be funded by the Fed to insulate it from political pressures.
